The Most Powerful Women Of The Channel 2007

The votes are in: meet the channel's top women execs

Although they come from all different corners of the channel community -- from vendors to distributors to resellers and systems integrators -- the 2007 50 Most Powerful Women of the Channel have one thing in common: They're all leading innovators driving growth in the channel.

BARBARA ASHKIN

VP & COOCXtecSyracuse, N.Y.Years in position: 7
Years in channel: 7

In the past year, Ashkin has helped CXtec double its voice and IP-telephony business and launch a $2 million technology exploration and conference center, where the VAR can showcase and demonstrate its products in a lab setting. Ashkin also participates in Cisco's Partner Executive Exchange group to help improve the vendor's channel programs and strategies.

WENDY BAHR

VP of U.S. ChannelsCisco SystemsSan Jose, Calif.Years in position: 2
Years in channel: 2

In the past year, Bahr implemented a new coverage model to support partners based on both their business plan models and experience selling Cisco's advanced technologies. This year, Bahr will focus on providing partners support and education on managed services, software-as-a-service and customized service solutions. Bahr is also a coach and mentor for the Cisco Women Unlimited Program.

As CEO of Inacom Information Systems, Benson has helped the business grow into a $65 million solution provider. She's also tapping her experience growing businesses to build out the "Make Mine a Million $ Business Program," an initiative that provides financing, mentoring, marketing and technologies to help women entrepreneurs grow their businesses.

LAURA BLACKMER

SVP of SalesOnForceNew YorkYears in position: 1.5
Years in channel: 20

Blackmer gained her reputation as a channel champ through 18 years of hard work at Hewlett-Packard, where she ran the company's Imaging and Printing Group channel. Now, as senior vice president of sales at OnForce, she's helping to turn OnForce into an industry force.

PAMELA BLACKWELL

PresidentCOOBlackwell Consulting ServicesChicagoYears in position: 3
Years in channel: 15

Responsible for $43 million in revenue and a staff of 300, Blackwell oversees the daily operations and leadership of this IT consulting firm. She's driven growth strategies to reposition sales and consulting pursuits to higher-margin opportunities. She also increased focus on commercial business, which led to services in financial, insurance and health care.

Director of Worldwide ChannelsFortinetSunnyvale, Calif.Years in position: 1.5
Years in channel: 10

Under Braud's leadership, Fortinet's global channel program earned its first VARBusiness five-star award in 2006 and again in 2007. Braud has revitalized the company's Americas partner program and used it to develop channel models in the EMEA and APAC regions as well. The tri-level Americas program offers deal registration and renewal tracking.

SHARON BRINDLEY

VP of U.S. Business ChannelsSMB, Printing SolutionsServices DivisionLexmarkLexington, Ky.Years in position: 2
Years in channel: 11

In the past year, Brindley has formed managed-service platform partnerships with Level Platforms, N-able and SilverBack; rolled out a partner print-managed service offering; increased channel resources; and drove efforts to promote teaming of direct and indirect sales forces to support SMB channel partners' growth.

Among Cage's accomplishments this year was that she oversaw the operational aspects of merging four more locations into Heartland Technology Solutions, which effectively doubled the company's size. Cage's efforts helped drive this solution provider to $11.5 million in revenue in 2006—which marks more than 82 percent growth over the past two years.

CHERYL COOK

VP of U.S. SalesSun MicrosystemsSanta Clara, Calif.Years in position: 1
Years in channel: 5

Cook's appointment to vice president of U.S. sales one year ago is one of the numerous executive shuffles that Jonathan Schwartz has engineered since taking over for CEO Scott McNealy. This one could prove positive for the company's partners, as in the past 12 months Cook grew U.S. indirect channel revenue by 5 percent.

LORI COOK

VP of Worldwide ChannelsProfessional ServicesBMC SoftwareHoustonYears in position: 2.5
Years in channel: 26

Cook designed and implemented new training and certification programs for partners. In addition, she launched a new beta program that incorporates partner feedback and gives early access to new solutions, as well as a Worldwide BMC Women's Network Group, where BMC's women leaders discuss career issues with all co-workers.

VP of Global MarketingADTRANHuntsville, Ala.Years in position: 6
Years in channel: 16

Conway rolled out a new global channel program this year, launched a telesales effort to bolster support for SMB resellers, and implemented a new opportunity-registration and management system, as well as an automated leads-distribution system. Among her initiatives now on tap: expanding certification training programs for partners.

JANET DILLIONE

President of Health Services DivisionSiemens Medical SolutionsMalvern, Pa.Years in position: 1
Years in channel: 25

Dillione last year became only the second woman ever to hold a division president title within Siemens Medical Solutions. She also led the company to sign a groundbreaking service-oriented architecture agreement with Partners Healthcare. This year, she'll focus on enhancing the company's R&D and service organizations for faster time to market.

DAWN DUROSS

Director of OperationsCisco SystemsSan Jose, Calif.Years in position: 4
Years in channel: 4

Duross, who manages all channel business for Cisco in the federal market, helped Cisco increase its advanced technology business in the double digits, and she also led IPv6 channel initiatives, including a partner summit. This year, Duross will focus her attention on developing a small-business program targeted at the small, disadvantaged business partner.

LEZLIE GALLAWAY

CEOTechnologentLake Forest, Calif.Years in position: 5
Years in channel: 20

With Gallaway at the helm, this $67 million solution provider is making a big name for itself. In the past year, it was honored as the fastest-growing women-owned company on CRN's Fast Growth 100 list and also as VARBusiness VAR of the Year. Under Gallaway's guidance, Technologent has launched a new division dedicated to providing IT solutions solely for the telecom industry.

Since acquiring KIS five years ago, Giordano has grown it from a $9 million company to a $30 million company through an aggressive expansion of customers and products. She is also a founding partner of the Women Impacting Public Policy group and a vocal advocate for small business.

This past year, Gooden succeeded retiring executive Michael Camardo as executive vice president, IT and Global Services, reporting to CEO Bob Stevens. Not one month after stepping into the new role, Gooden was tapped with driving the integration of $10 billion worth of business, as Lockheed Martin combined its Integrated Systems and Solutions and IT and Global Services businesses. She also worked to integrate key acquisitions and built a new $3 billion business pipeline. With a long history at Lockheed, Gooden was instrumental in growing the company's IT division from a one-customer division to a large enterprise with 14,000 employees that provide IT services to federal agencies in the United States as well as in 18 foreign countries.

JANA GRIMES

CEOAustin RibbonComputerAustin, TexasYears in position: 23
Years in channel: 23

Grimes is the founder and sole owner of this $55 million solution provider. Grimes transformed the company from a typewriter ribbon reseller into a professional-services firm. She's also driven revenue 37 percent and scored three Texas DIR contracts in the past year. She also signed a teaming deal with several large IT vendors, including Oki Data, Fujitsu and Brother.

CINDY GROGAN

VP of SolutionsASAP SoftwareBuffalo Grove, Ill.Years in position: 3
Years in channel: 4

As vice president of solutions for this solution provider, Grogan leads the growth of key solutions for ASAP—such as the solution provider's Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) asset-management solution—which have helped drive the company to revenue of $1.5 billion in 2006, landing it No. 47 on the VARBusiness 500 list.

Among her accomplishments in the channel, Grothjan helped drive 40 percent distribution growth from 2005 to 2006. In the past year, she realigned the inside sales team to better support partners, introduced new partner resources, such as a Dealer Registration and Opportunity Engine, and formed a partner advisory council.This year, Grothjan is focused on developing new training and educational resources for partners, working with distribution partners to provide more sales resources and adding new sales and technical field resources to help partners with business development.

With Hayes at the helm, this solution provider has grown by leaps and bounds into a $28 million company. But she is also taking time out to drive positive change in the channel as well. This year, she helped Sun Microsystems build a deal-registration program for its partners.

Hedrick recently returned her company to profitability after going public in 2005. In 2006, the company reported almost $29 million in revenue, up almost 18 percent from the year before. She also led the acquisition of McAleer Computer Associates, Mobile, Ala., in January 2007.

PAM KAPLAN

VP of Global Public Sector MarketingIBMArmonk, N.Y.Years in position: 1
Years in channel: 10

In the past year, Kaplan's efforts have helped drive a 5 percent year-over-year revenue growth through business partners and grow the number of IBM Public Sector business partners by more than 60 percent. Her efforts came as part of a $2 million investment into IBM's public-sector channel over the past 18 months.

In the past year, Kienast has integrated the disparate outbound marketing and sales support efforts of three companies—Presidio, NIS and Solarcom—as they merged into Presidio Networked Solutions. Kienast also played a key role in reducing the firm's distribution channel from seven to three distributors, resulting in annual savings of from $3 million to $5 million.

STEPHANIE KLEBER

VP of Channel ProgramsSage SoftwareIrvine, Calif.Years in position: 4
Years in channel: 23

Kleber is responsible for more than $250 million in revenue and spearheading the company's partner program, which earned a VARBusiness five-star rating. In the past year, Kleber launched two new growth programs for the channel. Among her key areas of focus this year is a program to help partners recruit and train field salespeople—a pain point for many VARs.

CAROL KURIMSKY

VP of MarketingIngram Micro North AmericaSanta Ana, Calif.Years in position: 1.5
Years in channel: 9

Kurimsky in the past year beefed up Ingram's marketing programs with data analytics, custom agency services, reseller recruitment marketing and lead-generation offerings. She also developed and rolled out a vendor-specific ROI measurement system for quantifying the success of manufacturers' marketing investments.

Print-managed services are hot in the channel, and Linsky has capitalized on that trend in the past year with the launch of new Specialized Business Units to support a print-managed services strategy. She also established a Content Management Solutions program.

In the past year, McDermott, formerly CEO of Access Distribution, was instrumental in the $415 million sale of Access to Avnet and has recently focused on integrating the two entities and creating joint business opportunities. It will be interesting this year to see if McDermott continues to stay with Avnet or takes on a new leadership role in the channel.

In the past year, Morris helped double the size of Arrow through the acquisitions and integrations of Alternative Technology and InTechnology's specialist distribution division. She also helped drive a third acquisition of Agilysys KeyLink Systems Group, with $1.6 billion in revenue. Together, the acquisitions under Morris' leadership transformed the company from a $2 billion to a $5 billion business.

Under Moser's guidance, Ricoh has recruited hundreds of new resellers and achieved top marks on the VARBusiness Annual Report Card. Moser in the past year has implemented a new program to increase demand-generation opportunities and is now developing a managed-services initiative to help drive a new revenue stream to resellers. Other initiatives include a sales realignment to increase focus on resellers.

Ochs has been busy developing the company's "All-Partner Territories" initiative, under which all deals outside of strategic accounts in these territories go through Oracle partners. This year, Ochs also plans to roll out the Oracle Partner Leadership Program, aimed to help the company and its partners work toward sales and leadership excellence.

O'Neil led the development of a new reseller support position at Panasonic in the past year. The new Partner Sales Manager is part of the company's initiative to recruit resellers to grow sales by selling Panasonic semi-rugged notebooks in addition to its traditional rugged line. This year, O'Neil plans to restructure the channel organization.

JULIE PARRISH

VP of U.S. Global Channel OfficeSymantecCupertino, Calif.Years in position: 8
Years in channel: 23

In the past year, Parrish rolled out four major partner portal upgrades that increased usage 90 percent year-over-year; launched three new online training programs for partners, which led to a 1,000 percent increase in partner training; and delivered a new opportunity-registration program for partners, which led to more than $1 billion in registered business in 12 months.

WENDY M. PETTY

VP of SalesFalconStor SoftwareMelville, N.Y.Years in position: 7
Years in channel: 18

In the past year, Petty has grown FalconStor's sales organization by 30 percent, implemented a new partner program, which got a VARBusiness five-star ranking, and started a new qualified lead program for partners. She's now rolling out a new sales model and training certification program for partners. Petty's also establishing a special interest group for women in storage.

As vice president of operations for this $30 million VAR, Piehler has built up a professional services and consulting practice—efforts that have led to 150 percent growth at the company since 2002. This year, she developed a marketing strategy uniting key vendor partners that led to a deeper and wider selling model for the company.

ALVA PURVIS

VP of Worldwide Channel EnablementMcAfeePlano, TexasYears in position: 4
Years in channel: 20

Under Purvis' guidance, the McAfee SecurityAlliance partner program surpassed 11,000 partners worldwide this year. The top channel executive also introduced a new services offering for partners and has plans under way to expand partner training to include solution selling through online and classroom workshops.

Since founding IAS in 1994, Rao built up the company into a solution provider with more than $100 million in revenue in 2006. In the past year, Rao continued to expand IAS geographically, opening new offices in three cities and increasing sales and engineering by 15 percent. Rao is also well-known for her environmental initiatives, encouraging IAS' vendors to grow their green solutions.

NANCY REYNOLDS

VP of SMB Channel Marketing and SalesTrend MicroCupertino, Calif.Years in position: 4
Years in channel: 23

Reynolds in the past year has focused on bolstering her staff to better support partners, and on implementing a new program for SMB solution partners. She's now working to better align channel and field sales and to grow partners that are specialized in vertical markets.

Rometty has helped drive IGS to expand its profit margins for nine straight quarters. For its most recent quarter, IGS sales were up 10 percent to $4.3 billion. This year, Rometty has spearheaded an effort, along with business partners, to create repeatable services based on software. She's also active in IBM's Women in Technology Council and the Leadership Council.

In the past year, Sigman drove the launches of Hitachi Data's new midmarket solution set; a new strategy aimed to expand partners' services revenue and profitability; and new planning mechanisms to grow partners' businesses. This year, Sigman will focus on expanding into new markets through new and existing partnerships and further expanding partners' services growth.

BRENDA STALLINGS

PresidentMatrix IntegrationJasper, Ind.Years in position: 25
Years in channel: 25

As president of Matrix Integration, Stallings helped the company grow into a $33 million VAR in 2006. In the past year, her efforts also helped the company earn a rank as one of the 30 best places to work in the state of Indiana. She also led the company to achieve new certification and partnership levels with IT giants the likes of Cisco, Hewlett-Packard and VMware.

VP of IT Service ManagementEngineeringEDSPlano, TexasYears in position: 2
Years in channel: 9

Stevenson oversees the delivery of IT services, data center facilities and clientinfrastructure engineering of this $21 billion IT outsourcing giant—the largest company on the VARBusiness 500 list. Her efforts helped drive EDS last year to its highest rate of contract signings—$26.5 billion—since 2001, including a 50 percent increase in its apps business.

Thibeault in the past year developed HP channel programs, including the HP PartnerONE New Business Opportunity Tool and the HP PSG Co-Marketing Program to drive partner growth. This year, Thibeault plans to implement new programs for the SMB market and public sector.

DEBRA THOMPSON

VP of ChannelsSolutions MarketingIBMArmonk, N.Y.Years in position: 2.5
Years in channel: 15

Thompson drove major changes to IBM's PartnerWorld program in the past year, including a new portal that enables partners to more easily forge partnerships across the partner ecosystem. Thompson also rolled out a consolidated profiling system. Now, the channel chief is changing IBM's business partner strategies to better support solution-selling in the SMB market.

ANGELA TRILLHAASE

SVP of Business DevelopmentMeridian Group Int'lDeerfield, Ill.Years in position: 4
Years in channel: 23

In her role at Meridian Group, an IT solution provider with 32 offices worldwide, Trillhaase in the past year drove $38 million in incremental revenue through cross-selling, established four multinational partnerships, helped close four acquisitions and the company's first six multinational deals. She's also leading an effort to bring together channel businesswomen.

Tuisl has been working to refine NEC's partner programs since their inception in 1998, and she's launched programs to enable VARs to specialize in such areas as digital signage--which have provided substantial incremental revenue opportunities for both NEC and its reseller partners. Among her current initiatives, Tuisl is working to drive more SMB business through partners.

As head of North American channel marketing for Intel, Turner oversees all channel marketing and program activities for distributors, system builders, integrators and VARs selling Intel's platform products. In the past year, she launched a new partner program and is working to further broaden the scope of the channel program and focus on matchmaking ISVs and VARs.

Watson in the past year drove the largest integrated partner launch effort in Microsoft's history to support Windows Vista, the 2007 Microsoft Office System, Exchange and Small Business Server, and rolled out the foundation for a new Partner Research System. Watson also established the first-ever Microsoft Partner Scorecard.

LISA N. WOLFORD

PresidentCEOCSSS.NETBellevue, Neb.Years in position: 10
Years in channel: 20

Wolford helped drive this solution provider's revenue up 23 percent in the past year and 400 percent over the past three years. Under her guidance, the VAR has also scored billions in government contracts. Wolford also recently established a Washington, D.C., office and expanded the business to pursue new federal market opportunities.

The CEO of this $7 million VAR scored a contract with the San Francisco Police Department for an IP-based videosurveillance project; expanded the company's sales force; helped guide Cisco on the launch of its SMB products and programs; sat on an Ingram VentureTech Advisory Board to help Ingram shape partner benefits; and still managed to raise twin boys.

In the past year, Wood helped extend all Business Objects' sales and technical online training to partners and access to instructor-led training at no charge. She also drove significant expansion of revenue around product and services opportunities for partners in the midmarket. This year, Wood will continue to expand midmarket solution offerings, marketing and training resources.

XChange Solution Provider 2015 is finally upon us and the timing couldn't be better. The premier channel event is happening March 1-3 in Dallas, bringing together 225 solution provider decision makers from across North America. CRN is at the event to provide news, analysis and a firsthand take from partners.